Where the Night Wind Howls
by L. Catherine Dion
Summary: An exploratory team goes missing after they dock at an ancient space station. With most of the main team off on their own, Commander Sarka Shepard and Zaeed Massani must figure out just what went wrong. It could mean their own deaths when it's obvious they aren't the only ones walking the halls.
1. The Calm Before the Storm

"Shepard." Zaeed was staring out the window, scowling at the long abandoned space station they'd been asked to investigate. "That piece of crap station doesn't even look stable."

"It's stable, Zaeed," she said, and not for the first time in the last fifteen minutes of approach. "The first recon team cleared it months before the exploration team was sent in.'

"And they didn't come back, now, did they?" he grumbled under his breath as he fiddled with his rifle, eyes narrowed. "That's why we're coming out here like a buncha jackasses looking for bodies, yeah?"

"Pretty much," Shepard said mildly, flicking a few switches. "Going to bring us around to dock."

"You're better with a shuttle than you are with a damned Mako or Hammerhead," Zaeed said, grudgingly. "So far, we haven't crashed. Yet." He crossed his arms. "Where the hell's Cortez, anyway? Shouldn't he be dropping us off?"

"Citadel, taking a few days of leave. I figured we could handle this one." She caught the look he angled her and laughed. "What? Tali and Garrus are off investigating another spot with Reaper tech, Javik is visiting Wrex, and Kaidan is getting his implants checked at the Citadel."

"We could have brought EDI," he said under his breath.

"Shut up and put your damn helmet on, Zaeed." She heard him mutter something probably derogatory as the seal snapped shut. In a second, her own was sealed as a soft bump and click had the docking seals in place. Minimal power to the automated docking systems suggested that the first team managed to get something going in the way of power.

"Better check out their transport first," Zaeed said over the comm as they moved down the causeway. They were both toting survival gear since it was obvious they were in for an extended stay. He hefted his bag warily.

"Signs of weapons fire. Scoring along the hull. Looks like a breach," Shepard noted, her comm crackling. "Grenade cluster, maybe."

"Batarians?" They cracked the seal on the ship and Shepard shook her head as the mess of charred remains. Four bodies.

"Could be," she said with a shrug. "Messy job."

"Fucking Batarians are always messy," Zaeed said pointedly. "I think they goddamn pride themselves on that shit." He waved his gun toward the main docking facility. "This is too torched to give us anything. Want to head in?"

"Mm," was her quiet response as she examined a body. It was too small and too human to be anything but a child. A young one, maybe five or six. The flesh had been completely burnt away, and it had been several weeks since the incident. Even a soldier didn't need a degree to tell how long a dead body had been dead. "I wasn't aware the exploratory team brought children with them."

"Report didn't say anything about goddamn kids," Zaeed said, clearly displeased as he peered over her shoulder. There was a sound in the distance and his head jerked around in line with his rifle. There was nothing there, not even the shimmer of a tactical cloak. Her hand caught his arm as he nearly squeezed off a shot, and stayed there for a half second until he relaxed. They needed conserve ammunition as it was.

"What's going on, Zaeed?" she asked loping carefully after him as he worked his way across toward Receiving. He didn't answer he right away and was quiet until the hatch to the main receiving bay was sealed.

"I still say it smacks of Batarians," was his only comment as she checked pressure and oxygen levels, and after deciding they were safe, cracked her helmet. Zaeed did the same and walked ahead a little, turning around to get a feel for the space.

"Scavengers, maybe," she said, rubbing at her head as she stowed the helmet in her bag. Shepard closed her eyes and listened to the way the station settled. She was still so long that Zaeed put both hands on her shoulders and grumbled her name.

"What the hell are you doing?" There wasn't any actual rancor to his voice, just genuine curiosity.

"Listening," she said, a slight smile easing across her face as she felt him go quiet behind her, his chin brushing the top of her head as she leaned back into him. "What do you hear?"

"Nothing," he said impatiently. She shook her head and touched his armored knuckles. Shepard could almost feel him roll his eyes. "Fine. Just so you know, I hate this game. You've been spending way too much time with that Asari, Samara."

"Zaeed," she murmured. "If you don't know how your surroundings feel-"

"I know, I know. Dead, captured, etcetera, blah fucking blah. I'm not a spring goddamn chicken, Shepard. I suppose I should be happy we're not getting shot at."

There was a pause.

"Yet," he added skeptically.

"You know you just jinxed it," she said mildly. His hands fell away and he gave her a little nudge forward. "Didn't answer my question."

"I hear a shitty, ancient, dilapidated space station that some fuckers decided to abandon because it was a junk heap," he said. "We gonna set up camp or what? There should be the first set of passenger quarters to the left, if this map is any good."

"Yeah, base camp first," Shepard said, gesturing. He lead the way as they made the initial sweep, chose one of the passenger rooms - one of the only ones that was unlocked. Shepard made sure it was defensible and decided that it wasn't worth trying to go through the hassle of unsealing anything else. About two hours into the deserted station, they found a few more bodies with the same char pattern in what she assumed was a laboratory. It looked like someone had survived long enough to try and radio out, only no one heard them.

"Shepard, we got trouble," Zaeed said, catching her arm as his omni-tool lit up. "There's an ion storm moving through this system. A massive one. Look at that thing." He shook his head. "It's a monster."

Both of them looked up as the station shuddered and alarms went off. A pleasant voice informed them of the storm's approach - and promptly shielded the entire station. Automatic systems seemed to functioning just fine, she noted.

"Those are blast doors," Shepard said as the first echoing boom cracked through the station. "It's cutting off access to-"

"The shuttle, goddammit," Zaeed snapped. "This was supposed to be a quick mission, not an extended stay." Her jaw tightened and she was suddenly glad she'd had them pack for contingencies just like this. Shepard wasn't sure when they began the frantic dash toward the shuttle, but they missed it as the heavy door sealed them in. With her back against the door, she let out a sigh, her eyes gritty.

"How long is that storm going to be around?" she asked, though she was already pulling up the information. The results weren't promising. A few days as it passed through the system. That explained why the team had little to no chance of aid. The ion storm had blocked comm traffic. Even if they could get to the shuttle, there was no way they'd get through the storm. The Kodiak just wasn't equipped to deal with shielding that much ionic activity- not safely.

"Long enough to complicate things," Zaeed said, the annoyance clear in his voice. "Just once, I want to go on a mission where we go in, shoot the jackasses and get out. No complications. A drink waiting for us at a bar. Easy."

"Keep dreaming," she said, shooting him a look "That terminal had been wiped, back there. No idea what they were working on. I can mess around with it, maybe see if I can restore the deleted data." Shepard squinted a little as she watched the projected course of the ion storm hit the station and as far away at to the actual mass relay. It was easily half a sector wide. "Gonna take some time, though."

"Apparently," he said with a snort, "we just got entirely too much of that." She watched his expression tighten as he shifted beside her. "Hallefuckin'lujah."


	2. Lullaby

Shepard stood at the doorway of the only open suite they could find and then moved into the apartment to get a look around. She still needed to piece together the garbled mess left behind by the deletion, but that wasn't going to happen when she could barely see straight. They hadn't done much but dump their stuff inside the room and leave for recon. Her bag in hand, she shook her head.

"One room?" she asked archly.

"Safer," Zaeed said gruffly. "I'll take the floor."

"You will not." She stopped abruptly and he walked right into her with a grunt.

"Goddammit, Shepard." She tilted her head back to give him a look. "I'm not gonna take the bed." They got to the bedroom and there was a long, long pause. It was a _massive_ bed.

"There's enough room," Shepard said quietly. "Think you can share nicely?"

"Nope," he said, folding his arms. "I don't share nicely at all. Haven't you heard? Mean sonuva bitch, nasty temper, cranky, punches shit for a liv-" She gave him a shove as she rolled her own eyes and stowed her gear.

"At this point, considering we've both been up for nearly twenty-four hours prep and transit time, plus the nearly eight hours we've been here? Yeah. _Sleep_. If you're a bed hog, I'm not going to give a shit. If you want to sleep on the floor and wake up stiff as hell, be my guest." Shepard gestured at the bed. "But c'mon, Zaeed, we could fit half the crew in this bed."

"Fine. Fair warning, I snore like a sonofabitch." He tossed his bag into the corner and worked off his armor. It'd go right back on as soon as he got a few hours of sleep or worked the kinks out of his shoulders, whichever came first.

"You want me to re-break your nose?" she said almost sweetly. He shot her a dirty look as she popped her suit and worked her way out of the armor. He rummaged around in his bag and disappeared into the next room. She could hear him scuffling around and when he came back he was in a tank and sleep pants - as comfortable as it got. He looked vaguely annoyed as he studied her from across the bed.

"Safer," he grumbled, almost as if he were talking to himself. "If there were more people, it'd be different." His eyes narrowed a fraction as he tossed a blanket at her. She caught it one handed. "Got the door set up with an alert. Proximity shit, few charges, too. We should be good to go. I'll-" Zaeed shrugged and sat on the edge of the bed. "Get some sleep, Shepard. I got first watch. Odds are if we both sleep, some shit's gonna crawl up in here and screw everything over."

It was sound judgment and standard procedure. Being comfortable was just a bonus.

"Gimme four hours," she said, curling up after a moment of prodding and attempting to figure out if she even liked the bed. Zaeed watched her impassively. "I'm good to go after that."

"Six," he countered. "You look like you haven't gotten any in a week."

"Four, Zaeed."

"_Five_ and don't give me shit. What's one more hour?"

"I'm not haggling like a Volus, you insufferable jackass," Shepard said, crossing her arms. "I probably won't even get four as it is."

"Shepard," Zaeed growled, "go the fuck to sleep."

"Asshole," she muttered into the pillow. He threw the other one at her hard enough that it bounced satisfyingly off her head and hit the floor. She propped herself up on an elbow, eyebrow cocked._ Really? _"What are you gonna do, Zaeed, pillow-fight me to sleep?"

"If it'll get you to shut your goddamn mouth, maybe." He was trying not to laugh, his arms crossed way the hell on the other side of the oceanic bed.

She just shook her head and rolled away as he dimmed the lights. Weariness won over amusement, something that had become as routine as putting her armor on when she was half asleep. A few minutes later, as Shepard struggled to settle, she could hear him cleaning his gun, the slide and scrub so comfortingly familiar that it lulled her to sleep. She wasn't sure, but she thought, just for a moment, he was humming under his breath. It wasn't particularly on key and she smiled.


	3. Sleep is for Shadows & The Lost

_Darkness. The sound of water dripping. Footsteps splashing, running. Decay. The sound of a gun charging. Penetrating cold that worked its way through her bones. Pressure on her shoulders, a snarl in the black._

_Stars._

_Pain blossoming in her chest and radiating downward, sharp, knife-like._

_Hazy images. Faces? Familiar shadows. Her breath came quick and shallow._

_Shepard._

_Struggle was a wash of fear, adrenaline, voices of the dead. Her dead._

_YOUR FAULT WE'RE DEAD._

_She choked as hands wrapped themselves around her throat and pressed, squeezing down on her carotid, digging in. Familiar faces. Dead faces. She tried to cry out, but couldn't. And there was nothing._

"Shepard!"

Disoriented, she snapped awake, to find that she had a death grip on Zaeed's shirt, and that she had somehow unconsciously flipped him over, straddling him with her biotics charged and sizzling. He raised his hands and she let go, her expression horrified as she froze in place.

"Zaeed?" Her voice came out rough. She was soaked through with cold sweat, shivering through she didn't feel particularly cold. His fingers brushed her hand against his chest.

"Just a dream," he said gruffly. "It wasn't real." Zaeed frowned. "You gonna hit me again?" Wordlessly, she shook her head and sat back, blinking as he shifted a little beneath her. "_Legs_, Shepard." She didn't move and he sighed before neatly tipping her off him, effectively reversing their positions as he leaned over her.

She stared up at the craggy lines of his face, following the path of his scarring up to his artificial eye. Her fingers just barely touched his jaw and she felt him still, hanging there like he wasn't sure what to do.

"You with me, Shepard?" he asked, his voice low. It wasn't soft, though, it was weathered, graveled, and wary. She let out a breath.

"I'm with you, Zaeed," her own voice matched his. "How long?"

"Two hours," he said, his eyes half closing as she ran her fingers up his face, not quite touching him. Her caught her hand just as her thumb brushed his cheek. "Power fluctuation. The heavy anti-ionic barriers came online just after you went down."

His breath fogged the air.

"Been getting colder in here since."

"Suits?"

"Suits," he agreed.

"So much for sleep," she said under her breath, gathering her gear and tugging herself back into the jumpsuit before snapping her armor back on. The heating units immediately kicked in and she let out a sigh.

"C'mon," Zaeed said, "let's go check those generators. Maybe we can siphon some of that power back where it belongs. Don't want _The Normandy_ to find a bunch frozen cor-" He glanced at her, deciphering the look she was giving him almost instantly, and held a hand up. Corpses, frozen. Right, She'd been one of those not too long ago. He got it.

"Just move," she said, forgoing the helmet for the time being. The suit warmed enough of her that she didn't need the added protection or bulk of a helmet. Zaeed grumbled something under his breath that sounded like a string of obscenities.


	4. Cannibals & Trophies

Main engineering was a mess with half charred bodies littered in front of dead or flickering consoles. Both she and Zaeed fell quiet as they surveyed the scene, taking it in and piecing the attack together with trained eyes. A stool had been toppled toward the back and Shepard found the charred remains of a leg, all that was left of the fire that had burnt itself out days ago. Three consoles were damaged beyond repair, and though she wasn't Engineer class, her early tinkering abilities and training informed her that there was no way they were going to be able to do much from this room.

"We'll have to find an auxiliary console somewhere," Shepard said, letting out a frustrated sigh and switching her diagnostic program off. Burnt and fried applied to most of the room, including the bodies of at least three more team members. The melted face of a doll had hardened against one of the sleek consoles and she dropped to a knee in order to get a look at it.

"We could have used Tali on this one," Zaeed said, finally breaking his self-imposed silence. "She would have found a way to rig something."

"Guess that's my job, now," Shepard said dryly. "I'm just happy I decided to keep up with my mechanical tinkering hobbies."

"Only reason you went Vanguard track was because you were biotic?" Zaeed glanced at her as she pried open a panel.

"_Mm_," she said, rummaging around in the guts of a console as she figured out the wiring processes. Older, sure, but the way it was set up was semi-familiar. "I'd have gone Engineer like my father, but Vanguard seemed a better use of my biotics. First experience in the Alliance Navy was to be told that, despite my interest in mechanics, they needed me to shape up my biotic skills since they could actually use them." Shepard shook her head. "Maybe I bucked the system here and there, but I did what I was told, eventually. I don't regret it. But, I never gave up on mechanics. It's kinda nice to be able to make something work." Her omni-tool flashed on as she activated it and let it scan for analysis. "It's obvious someone didn't want the team digging around here. We just have to figure out why." She scowled at the readings and shook her head.

"You can't reroute power away from the shielding, can you?" He was in there with her, poking at the inert wires, shifting them this way and that. Zaeed knew what he was looking for, that was for sure. Shepard shook her head and frowned just a little.

"From what I can tell, the damage is pretty extensive and leaves the current relays about the only ones usable. See?" She pointed to where several filaments had been shredded and popped due to extreme heat and what looked like direct electrical current damage. "At least from where we are right now," Shepard said, rubbing at the bridge of her nose in frustration. "Auxiliary console should be located," she pulled the map up and frowned, "two floors up. If we're lucky, the violence didn't get that far and it'll be untouched. Might be able to reroute there."

"Big _might_ from the look of things," Zaeed said, his expression sour. "Someone torched it like they meant it." He'd know something about torching things like that. Zaeed caught the faint smirk she tried to hide and nudged her. "Get moving, then, Shepard, else we're both gonna freeze our asses off. Kinda like to keep mine intact, spent alotta years getting out of shit like this."

"And into it," she said dryly, easing out of the room.

"Hey, you mind your goddamn tongue," he grumbled. "All sorts of reasons I got into what I did, and all of them got a story. Good goddamn stories, too."

"They always are."

"I once got marooned on this planet where a buncha cannibals tried to gnaw my-"

"Now you're just screwing with me." She squinted over at him, her expression skeptical at best, but definitely amused. "And I'm not sure I need to hear the rest of that sentence."

"Nah," he waved. "C'mon, Shepard. I know you're a sucker for a good story. Me, a piece of bone, about twenty crazy natives, and a cooking pot the size of table."

"Don't tell me you sharpened that bone with your teeth," she said dryly as they moved down the corridor. "And why the hell were they cannibals?"

"Plenty of buggy planets out there. Some'll turn you right off your gord. Hell if I know why they ate each other - or anyone who was unlucky as shit to get stranded there. I didn't fucking stop long enough to enquire into their perverse goddamn cultural habits, now, did I? Me, I just offed as many as I could and jammed myself back into that non-functional piece of shit shuttle I was stuck with. Shoulda seen me jury rigging shit up like I was king of the goddamn omni-tool. The hell if I didn't have motivation, though. I stripped everything I could and patched the engines back together with fucking chewing gum and rainbows out my goddamn arse. Life support was pretty much a joke. Guess I was goddamn lucky to have made it through the mass relay and to port. Mighta been a little Asari blue when I got pulled out. Rough trip. Ran out of oxygen right before I docked."

Zaeed snorted.

"I still got that bone somewhere, if you want a look."

"Might take you up on that when we get back," she said with a shake of her head. Zaeed fucking Massani and his insane tales. She was never sure if she believed him or not, but he knew how to tell a story, that was for sure. It got them down the long passage to the lift that took them from Engineering to the Operations deck. He leaned back against the elevator wall, giving her a long look and a slightly smug smile. He always did enjoy showing off his trophies to pretty much anyone who found time to wander by him. She supposed she was like that with her fish and model ships. And maybe the space hamster.

"Yeah?" Definitely smug. "Maybe a drink, too, to celebrate getting the fuck off this crap heap." The lights flickered and he glanced up, uncrossing his arms to tighten his grip on his side arm. Shepard took a step away from the door as the lift jerked and rattled.  
"That doesn't feel like storm damage," she said under her breath. Alarms went off a second later as the lift shuddered once more, grinding to a halt, before the power went out.

"Shit." Zaeed's voice was a quiet growl and under the amber glow of her ignited omni-tool, he looked even more unhappy than that one word might have suggested. There wasn't an access hatch that she could find. No out besides the main door and neither one of them wanted to try prying it open in case the power came back on. Good way to lose your head - or limbs. The lift strained, metal grating, and she felt it rock as an explosion came from somewhere above them. "Hold onto something."

"There's nothing to hold on to, Zaeed!" No hand rails, smooth floor, nothing to grab at all. Zaeed said nothing, but pulled her down with him so they were both braced against the wall. Her heart in her throat, she realized that the elevator was about to drop. A pop-whoosh came from above them and Zaeed let out a string of obscenities as her omni-tool deactivated. Her hands found his arm.

"This is going to hurt," he said.

And they dropped.


	5. Long Walks & Awkward Moments

Pain.

She breathed through it and stayed still while she figured out just how injured she was. It was mostly her shoulder and the back of her head Maybe a few ribs, but her vision didn't swim when she finally moved her head. Good enough to get moving. At some point during the drop, she'd lost consciousness, and had been the sharp jerk of the lift screeching to an abrupt stop that jolted her back into a red-hazed world filled with smoke and the heat of a fire. She took a breath and found herself gagging on smoke as she groped for her gun.

"Zaeed?" Her suit was working overtime to keep her cool as she struggled to her feet, her eyes narrowed as she reached out to find him. He didn't answer her. A sweep found him in the opposite corner, unconscious but alive. The walls of the lift were hot enough that she winced as she pulled him away toward the center of the elevator where it was a little cooler. There had to be a way off - no lift came without emergency measures. There had to be a hidden panel or something that would allow her to release the doors or at least partially open them.

Her fingers brushed the area next to the door, feeling for any sort of shift in the texture or some sort of hidden edge. She knew that if she didn't find something soon, their suit systems would give and they'd essentially bake to death. That was definitely on her list of ways she didn't want to die. Suffocation and being frozen to death were there, too, but she figured she could cross those off because she'd already died that way once.

_There_.

Her fingers caught a section of paneling that was lighter than the others. When she pressed in, it gave and she swung the thin metal panel open. It took another thirty seconds to locate the small lever to put the door into manual release. When the door popped open, a rush of fresh but frigid air washed over her. With some work, she managed to force the doors open enough so that she could ease her way out and pull them open a little wider to get Zaeed out. The screech and tear of metal spurred her on, tugging him out of the lift as fast as she could. She knew what that sound meant - the jammed metal was giving away. If she didn't clear Zaeed from the door, he'd likely lose his legs or worse. Medigel was good, but she wasn't sure if it was good enough to stop that much trauma.

"Zaeed, dammit," she snarled. "_Help me_, you jackass." Shepard felt him stir, groggy and confused, but with it enough to help her with a herculean tug. It sent both of them flying backwards just as the lift disappeared down the long shaft and the horrifying scream of metal tearing that left her as breathless as the impact of his weight against her chest.

"The _hell_, Shepard?" He let out a grumble and righted himself, a hand pressed against the ugly bruise blossoming across the side of his face where he'd landed. The skin had split just enough to make it a bloody mess, though.

"I'm not the one who was out cold just now. Don't you blame me for the fact that you nearly became a double amputee," the words came out snappish, but she didn't mean them. There were sharp edges of relief to them and when he pulled her sitting, her jaw tightened. "Let me see."

"I'm fine." She snagged his jaw when he tried to turn away. "I said I'm _fine_. It's just a goddamn bruise. Maybe a split, not the fucking apocalypse."

"Shut up and hold still. This'll take two seconds if you'd let me treat it," Shepard said, shaking her head gingerly as she used her omni-tool to scan the injury - and his head. He was right, he was fine, just a little banged up. Like her, no concussion, at least. She let out a long sigh and applied medi-gel to close the wound so it wouldn't be compromised by the cold. Cold and wounds went about as well as a slice and a cesspit of germs. Her breath fogged the air in front of her and she shifted.

"Told you I was fine," he said, his voice just smug enough that she popped him one in the shoulder and glowered at him. He peered at her. "No offense," he said dryly, his frown more than a little concerned, "but you look like shit."

"I've looked worse," she said, but let him take a look, anyway. They both essentially had the same injuries from being thrown around like rag dolls inside of a metal box. "Guess I should have grabbed that helmet."

"Makes two of us. Didn't know we'd be bombed down a fucking elevator shaft, else I'd have insisted." She nudged him with a snort and despite everything, let out a laugh. "You still thinking Batarian?"

"With those grenades and charges?" Her eyebrows arched as he turned her cheek into the dim emergency lighting and applied medi-gel. "Hell yes."

"Right," he said gruffly. "Let's get the hell out of here and figure out what the goddamn hell is going on. I'm gonna take this bastard down and tear his spine out. I get having a bad day, but this is fucking unbelievable."

"Zaeed," Shepard said dryly, "this is a walk in the park compared to pretty much every other mission we've be offered. Come on, surely you haven't forgotten the Collector base." Zaeed gave her a dirty look that said he wasn't going to be discussing that clusterfuck.

"Joker said this'd be a pile of shit," he grumbled under his breath, hauling her up by the elbow. He jerked his thumb over his shoulder towards the opposite end of the maintenance shaft. "I'm starting to think he's smarter than he fucking looks."

"You'd be right," Shepard said, grimacing slightly as she popped her shoulder and let out a sigh of relief. The station creaked as they fell silent and worked their way down the long corridor. The thin stretch of shaft with its knee high railing was wide enough that it could take a body stretched across it, but not much more. The sound of something scrabbling somewhere around them made her tense. The echo of the sharp noise could have been above or below. Dead space stations didn't have rats unless they'd stowed away with their assassin friend or the arriving exploration team.  
There was another explanation, too, one which she wasn't sure she wanted to entertain. It revolved around the idea that there just might be something more than a Batarian assassin on board. As to what was out there, she had a feeling they were going to find out sooner or later. Mid-way, she found a small grappling hook gun and some blood spatter. It looked like whomever had landed her before they did had run into trouble. She hooked it to her belt with a frown as Zaeed called her name.

"Pieca crap is locked or jammed," he said, prying open a panel on the wall to see if he could find the release mechanism. "Well, shit. There goes that. This looks like a goddamn varren chewed the wires. We got another way out? I''ll keep digging around here, but this is a mess. It's like something dropped acid allover the controls once I get past the wiring. The nub that's left of the door's manual control isn't even enough to pull."

"I guess we're looking for a ladder then, either up or down," Shepard said, squinting a little as she moved back the way they came. At the worst possible scenario, they'd have to rig their own ladder. That would mean the possibility she'd have to lose her suit to keep herself as light as possible. Zaeed, too. Lessening their protection, especially with the temperature drop, wasn't an ideal situation. Lowering or raising their gear was a possibility, though. She stood at the edge of the walkway and glanced down. There wasn't even an edge that she could see. Zaeed was going to have to help her if she was going to attempt a grappling hook shot. She unhooked the gun from her belt and turned it over in her hands.

"Shepard?"

"If I lean out there," she thumbed to the space beyond, "and try and aim this hook up to the next level, you think you can manage to hang on long enough for me to pull myself up?"

"As long as you're not gonna leave me to freeze my goddamn arse off down here, sure." He shrugged easily. "That thing calibrated for your suit's weight?"

"Probably not," she said.

"You're gonna freeze." Shepard gave him a look and he held up his hands. "Fine, but if you lose a goddamn toe or some shit-"

"Zaeed," she said dryly, "just don't let me fall." He gave her a long searching look and shrugged.

"You won't fall," he said quietly, confident as usual. She offered him a wry smile.

Shepard popped her chest plate off and then worked on the rest of her armor, neatly stacking them together and securing them with equipment belting from her small supply pack. She rubbed at her arms absently as the cold descended and swore she could feel it leeching every last bit of warmth from her bones. Zaeed eyed her, his expression somewhere between amused and concerned. She let out a slow breath and shut out the cold as best as she could.

"How we working this, Shepard?" He gestured at the low railing.

"Only way I can get a direct sight to the level above us is by hanging way out there and shooting straight up. That railing is too low to be of much help." Shepard gave him a mildly amused look.

"Can't say I've done this all that often before," he said in a gruff but equally amused tone of voice. "Right. Let's get this over with." If she were anything but professional, this would have be about twenty times more awkward, but he lifted her up, waited patiently while she locked her legs around his middle, and then edged a little more forward until he was sufficiently braced against the railing. It took effort on both of their parts, but Shepard eventually made it out there.

"You see it?" Zaeed asked, his voice strained.

"Just gotta get a good shot," she said, aiming.

"Hurry it up, Shepard," he grumbled. "This angle's awkward enough without you-"

"It's fine. Just shift just a little more to your-"

The station rocked hard just as she fired and as her shot hit, she was pulled hard enough forward that she was forced to let Zaeed go or send him tumbling into the depths. There was a dizzying amount of space between her and the deck as she swung outward, but the line held. His voice was a roar from somewhere below her as she flicked the gun's controls to pull her up as quickly as possible.

"Shepard!"

Her still gloved hands bit into the side of the catwalk above them and she started to haul herself up. Her shout down to Zaeed at least let him know she was still there. Just as she shifted her weight to swing herself up, something hard smashed down on her hand. Instinctively, she went to charge her biotics and was rewarded with a bright blossom of pain that fired down her spine. A hand closed around her arm and yanked her up. The grappling gun plummeted from her hand as the she was lifted up and then snagged by the throat.

Sparks danced in front of her eyes even as she sought clear her vision.

Batarian.

"This is for Bahak, _Commander_."

Pain exploded across the back of her skull as she was driven into the metal deck. The last thing she saw before everything went dark was the Batarian's smug smile.


End file.
